


After The Storm

by The_Wavesinger



Category: Agent Carter (TV)
Genre: (kind of), F/F, Future Fic, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Reminiscing, Spies & Secret Agents, Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-14
Updated: 2019-02-14
Packaged: 2019-10-27 08:01:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17762894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Wavesinger/pseuds/The_Wavesinger
Summary: The last time Peggy sees Dottie, it’s in 1991, at Howard Stark’s funeral.





	After The Storm

**Author's Note:**

  * For [osprey_archer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/osprey_archer/gifts).



The last time Peggy sees Dottie, it’s in 1991, at Howard Stark’s funeral.

Or, well, that’s a lie. The _beginning_ of the last time Peggy sees Dottie is at Howard’s and Maria’s funeral.

A flash of black from the corner of her eyes, indistinguishable from the rest of the sea of black in the church yet somehow different. Peggy tenses from where she’s seated, but puts the thought out of her mind, because _Howard_. She still can’t—

And the tears prick at her eyes again, and she bows her head.

 

***

 

After the burial (a private ceremony, nearest and dearest only, in contrast to the elaborate grandiosity that was the main part of the funeral), Peggy picks her way out of the graveyard. Tony’s still standing near the grave, and that’s—

Howard didn’t let her meddle in that while he was alive (while he was _alive_ , fuck, and no matter how many times it happens this after part never gets easier). She still doesn’t understand. Better to leave that to family. Obadiah will take care of him, she thinks. Hopes.

She’s so lost in her own thoughts that she doesn’t notice the figure making its way up to her (or maybe Dottie’s still that good, even after all this time—not out of the realm of possibility) until a voice says, in her ear, “Hello, Peggy.”

Peggy jumps. “What—” It’s been fifteen years and three continents since she last saw Dottie, and she’s gotten out of the habit of expecting her.

“Did you miss me, Peg?” And it’s the same flirty smile on an older, lined face. Peggy suddenly wants to cry.

Instead, she squares her shoulders and says, “Wouldn’t’ve thought to see you here.”

Dottie shrugs. “Ah, well, I had a funeral to go to. A friend of a—someone I know.”

“I thought you didn’t like Howard,” Peggy says.

“Now when did I say that?”

Peggy gives her a _look_. Dottie sighs. “Alright, fine. Though—I didn’t mind him, you know. He was interesting. But if it was just him I wouldn’t’ve come.”

“What, you have a mission that involves me again? After all this time?”

“No.”

And that—Peggy had known that already, in some corner of her mind, but the sheer simplicity of Dottie’s statement takes her breath away. She can’t—she won’t—

Dottie steps closer to Peggy, kisses her, deep and passionate, like the first time she kissed Peggy almost fifty years ago. (Only now the fainting lipstick is gone, thank goodness. She’s broken enough bones that she doesn’t want to hit the ground hard in this body.) “Come on, Peg. Let’s go get something to eat.”

 

***

 

“I’m sorry about Howard,” Dottie says, once they’re settled in a quaint little café that looks like a place Peggy might have frequented back when she’d first left the SSR and started at SHIELD. “I really am.”

Peggy sighs over the rim of her teacup. Ceylon with milk, because her tastes changed. “It’s—it was just me and him for a long time, you know, after Steve. Well, there was never really an after Steve for him, but. You know what I mean.”

“Yeah.” Dottie blows on her coffee. Black, no sugar; Dottie’s tastes haven’t. Or rather, Dottie’s tastes when she’s with Peggy haven’t. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s just—a car accident.” Peggy’s hand rattles her cup. She puts it down on her saucer, sharp and precise. “Wasn’t exactly the way I imagined it. We have so many enemies, the both of us,” (and oh, isn’t that ironic, that she’s saying that sitting across from Dottie Underwood, of all people) “and we’re not young, but it’s a car accident that kills him and Maria.” And that’s a thought that still hurts.

“Strange, with all your enemies.” And Dottie’s looking at Peggy in that old familiar way, and oh. _Oh_. Peggy’s not sure if that’s information she wants. But she has it now, apparently, if she’s reading this right.

“Strange.” Peggy echoes the word deliberately.

Then Dottie shakes her head, short and sharp. “Sorry, I’m seeing ghosts these days.” She smiles at Peggy in that oh-so-charming way of hers. It’s silly, but Peggy finds herself smiling back even as she stores the nugget of information away. “I did come here for you, though.”

“I know. We seem to keep coming back, don’t we.” Then, because she’s being more honest with herself these days, “Well.” Well. She refuses to feel guilt for—everything, because Dottie sure as hell won’t. No regrets. But still.

“We sure as hell do.” Then Dottie laughs. “You know, you said exactly that to me in Prague, the third time.”

Peggy frowns at her. “And then you stabbed me right in the gut if I’m not remembering wrong.” Although. It did save her from drinking her coffee, which turned out to have a poison that would’ve meant instant death, but still. It’s the principle of things.

“You were going to take me to prison. Did that for you once, never doing it again.”

“Well, you managed to run off that time, didn’t you.”

“But that was such a great start to our relationship!”

“Odd, I remember that starting quite a bit earlier and on quite a different note.”

“But my version is so much better.” Dottie tosses her hair, and, in an easy motion, reaches across the table and takes Peggy’s hand.

That’s—it still feels strange for Peggy. It’s not that she doesn’t like the thrill she gets when Dottie touches her, but. It’s a _lot_. Dottie is a lot, and it’s always breathtaking and like a whirlwind, everything that happens when they collide. But there’s still so much in Dottie’s eyes when she looks at Peggy. Dottie looking right at Dottie, like she’s doing right now, always makes something in her chest twinge. A familiar, painful feeling. “Dottie—”

Dottie shakes her head. “Don’t.” Her voice is suddenly deadly serious in a way Peggy hasn’t heard it to be in—well, ever. “Don’t. Let’s just enjoy the moment, shall we.”

And because Peggy owes Dottie so much (and because Dottie owes Peggy so much, too, but their debts don’t work in the cancelling each other out way) she honors Dottie’s request. She just lets Dottie hold her hand as they sip their drinks in silence.

Dottie’s done with her drink long before Peggy is, and she just looks at Peggy. It’s a little unnerving, but Peggy looks back, because she can’t not.

At length, though, Peggy finishes too. And she doesn’t want to let go, doesn’t want to get up, but she still has a life to go back to. Still has a million things to do, a million more now, suddenly. As much as she wants to, she can’t use Dottie to shield herself from her duty much longer. “Dottie.”

“I know.”

They get up together, walk out together. At the doorway of the store, Dottie kisses Peggy again, a kiss both of them pour everything they have to say into. Peggy’s eyes close when she leans into the kiss, and when she opens them again, Dottie is gone.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [One Last Kiss (The Final Storm Remix)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20433446) by [Redrikki](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Redrikki/pseuds/Redrikki)




End file.
